Computer lagging...

Arg, I've got a problem. For some reason lately I've been noticing that my computers performance has been greatly reduced. I never had this problem before, and I'm pretty frustrated. What happens is that my computer keeps scanning my floppy drive for no apparent reason. This happens usually every few minutes. Also, just about non-stop I hear the sound of the processor (or whatever that scratchy sound is when the computer is opening a program and such) inside the computer. And, plus my Norton Utilities alert keeps coming on saying that I'm using too much commit memory. This is all paired with alot of lag and error message closings, programs open veery slowly and it's just plain laggy. If anyone knows what's going on please answer.

its a prob with the ram and integrated video. u were lucky to have xp up and running at all, now it just dont have enough memory, even for you paging file. u dont have enough phyisical
memory to use the commit charge. that scratchy sound is ur hard drive trying to do stuff. you will never fix it without more memory so....get some. dont waste your time, just go get some more memory, cause i am 150% sure thats what it is...

Yeah, I was kind of thinking that that was the problem (even though I said it wasn't ). I have been trying to convince my parents to get more RAM but I'll just have to push harder. I knew that the lack of memory would cause a problem, the system requirements for XP do say 128Mb (and by the way this computer is relatively new and came with XP installed and the 128Mb of RAM). Anyway, thanks.

i do believe the floppy seek is you norton antivirus auto protect , constantly scanning it for viruses. what version norton is it? 2002?
2001 is not compatible in xp. u can disable all that norton auto stuff and it should fix it, but if your on norton 2001, get 2002.